But Not Destroyed
by Morel
Summary: The final battle that ended the Second Age. Based on canon - NOT the movie version. 12-10-2002: minor revisions, and Author's Notes moved to a separate chapter.


But Not Destroyed  
  
Disclaimer: I don't own Middle-earth or any of its characters (there are no original characters in here.) However, I do own all the words spoken by these characters in this story.  
  
Author's Note: The rating is for some sword-fighting. There are no gory descriptions. Enjoy!  
  
**************************************************************************** ****************  
  
The battle raged over the plateau of Gorgoroth. The allied hosts of Gil-Galad, Lord of the Noldor, and Elendil the Tall fired a salvo at the forces of Barad-dûr, and the black arrows of Númenór slew many as they stood.  
  
"For Anárion!" cried Isildur, son of Elendil, as he launched his shot. This, in the year since Anárion his brother had been crushed by a stone launched by some catapult from the Dark Tower, had become his battle cry.  
  
The army of Orcs and evil men had diminished, but the Alliance had defeated many such hosts in their seven-year siege of Barad-dûr, and had come no nearer, it seemed, to achieving their goal: to break the stronghold of Sauron the Lord of Terror, and to bring it as low as Thangorodrim after the Valar banished Sauron's master to the Void.  
  
For long, the Dúnedain had believed the Dark Lord destroyed with their island home beyond the sea. Yet it was not so, and they fought now, though they knew that many of them would die in doing so, for if they fought not, they would be made slaves in body of Sauron the Abhorred, darker than darkness, as he had made most of their former homeland slaves in mind.  
  
The allied army advanced. Orodruin lay in the distance behind them, perhaps five miles back, and the Dark Tower itself was visible, alone, terrible, and tall beyond measurement, as if it wished to vie with the mountains. The spires that crowned it seemed to rend the sky itself.  
  
The force of the Enemy retreated towards this stronghold, though the forces of Elves and Men killed more, for he who directed their movements cared not for mere individual lives. Even as they withdrew a new force, of expanse as great as the eyes of any could see, and led by a terrible general on horseback, issued from the Tower. As he rode nearer Gil-Galad thought that he had known this figure before, perhaps many long years ago, though not clothed in the raiment of darkness that he now wore.  
  
Elendil perceived that the enemy force he now faced was too great for him and his son to overtake, even with Gil-Galad's aid. "We must retreat!" he said to Isildur. "We can join with Elrond's battalion some distance back, and then we may hold our ground."  
  
"Hold our ground! Hold our ground!" said Isildur. "Has not Anárion lain unavenged too long? Shall we ever hold our ground, and never gain any?"  
  
"We have no choice," replied Elendil. "Remember, he who fights and runs away - "  
  
Isildur cut him off. "Lives to die another day!" He glared at his father. "Enough! I shall make my stand here, though I be alone against all evil that ever was!"  
  
Elendil remained calm. "Pride and will alone cannot conquer an enemy," he answered. "This foe that we now face cannot be slain by one alone."  
  
Though he was not glad to do so, Isildur relented. "Retreat!" he cried. "Anárion, you must wait still to be avenged! May it not be long!"  
  
The hosts of Elendil, Isildur, and Gil-Galad retreated across the barren Gorgoroth. Elrond, seeing the retreat, advanced his forces to solidify the center, where he thought the enemy would attack first. In twenty minutes, their forces met.  
  
The general of the Enemy had continued to advance, and his soldiers had shot many, but once Elrond joined the fray, the tide seemed to turn. The arrows of the Men of the West flew again, and Isildur's cry "For Anárion!" was heard. Then the general raised his hand, and a brilliant and yet terrible golden light was seen between his fingers, as if a great fire burned there.  
  
Commanded by this, the swarms of Orcs and evil Men rushed against the center of the army's position. Even though Elrond had strengthened this point, the Last Alliance took great losses, for the Orcs fought as if driven by a madness. The horses of Elendil and Isildur his son were shot, and they slew Orcs and men with their swords. Gil-Galad dismounted, and many that day felt in their last moment of life his spear, Aeglos. Though they had defeated this skirmish, the leaders of the allied forces all sensed, though none said it, that the power of this general was greater than anything that they had yet faced.  
  
"We must retreat again!" said Gil-Galad. "If we can reach Orodruin, we will be able to take the higher ground, and thus gain an advantage."  
  
Though Isildur did not wish to retreat again so soon, he saw that there was no choice, and it was best to do it before the enemy forces turned this battle into a rout. He did not argue.  
  
The retreat began. The armies, though the arrows of the Enemy still rained upon them, ran as fast as their legs could move towards Orodruin. The enemy general led his minions forward at a great pace, yet he rode ahead of them. Elendil's and Gil-Galad's forces stayed far enough away that they were not merely targets for the arrows of the Orcs, yet few thought it far enough. Indeed, in that time many died running as poisoned arrows tore into their backs.  
  
As the allies took their position on the slopes of Mount Doom, the general came close enough that Gil-Galad, with his sharp eyesight, could see him in greater detail. His helm was black and impenetrable to any vision, and crowned with many spikes, like the tower of Barad-dûr itself. The general lifted his great hand, and Gil-Galad perceived that it bore a ring with words engraved on it. The writing on the ring, although brighter by far than the ring itself, could not be read even by elvish eyesight from this distance, but the Lord of the Noldor did not need to read these letters to know what they said.  
  
"It is Sauron!" he declared. "There is nowhere to retreat! Here we must make our last stand. But do not despair! This may be our darkest hour . . . or our finest!"  
  
"Or both," said Elendil, but none understood his words as he said them.  
  
The Men of the West and the Elves met the enemy legions with all the strength they had, which was no small amount. Yet though Orcs fell in numbers uncountable and much of their evil blood stained the ground, many valiant elvish and Númenórean warriors joined them in death. Still Sauron rode forward, towards the allied leaders.  
  
"Elrond!" said Gil-Galad. "Go! Fight the enemy with such forces as you still have! We shall have the victory, even if we all fall lifeless!"  
  
"That shall not be!" Elrond brought together his forces for another attack, and marched forward against the seemingly endless legions of Orcs.  
  
Sauron rode on still, and suddenly dismounted his black horse and stood. He was extremely tall, tall enough to dwarf even Elendil. He swung his great mace at Isildur, and only his strong suit of armor saved him from death. Still, he was in great pain, and could not get up to strike back. He spat at Sauron, powerless to do anything else.  
  
Then Sauron, the Abhorred, spoke. "Ha! Now comes the end of you, lords of lost realms that shall never again stand!"  
  
Elendil was inflamed by these words. "Nay, it is your end, thrall of thralls! You shall join your tyrant master in the Void whence you came!"  
  
In answer to this, Sauron swung his great mace, thinking to eliminate him who had dared call him, King of Men, thrall. Elendil narrowly avoided the blow, and Gil-Galad struck the Dark Lord with his spear. Sauron recoiled with pain, but he swung his weapon again, and Gil-Galad was crushed to the ground. He swung it again at Elendil, who dodged, and lifted up Gil-Galad, who was not yet dead, and his fire-hot hands burnt him, and he threw the body. Thus died Gil-Galad, last of the kings of the Noldor in Middle-earth.  
  
Now Elendil was filled with a fury. His eyes blazed with rage, and he took his great sword, Narsil, which means Shining Fire, and attacked with such speed that even Sauron, who was of old of the Maiar and existed before Arda, and was powerful even among them, hardly stopped it. With the same speed, Elendil drew back his sword, and struck again. Again, Sauron blocked.  
  
Though Elendil struck with incredible strength, he stood on the slopes of Orodruin, where the One Ring that Sauron wore on his finger was forged, and where its power was greatest, and the Dark Lord's power was great indeed. For long this battle continued, Elendil ever aiming for whatever seemed the point that his enemy had left undefended, while Sauron's mace came with equal speed to stop the blow. At last, Elendil began to tire, and Sauron thought he saw his chance. He attacked Elendil, rather than defend against his blows, yet Elendil leapt away, and gripping Narsil with both hands he smote Sauron, and he was wounded greatly. Yet his mace still traveled, and it hit Elendil in the head, and he landed on the ground on top of his sword, and it shattered. Sauron had struck what would have been an immediately mortal blow for any lesser man, and Elendil knew he had little time left to live. Yet he saw the wound he had made alongside that struck by Gil-Galad, and even at the threshold of death he smiled and spoke.  
  
"Now you fall, tyrant."  
  
Even as he said these words, the wounds overcame Sauron, and he dropped to his knees, and at that moment Elendil's strength was at last spent, and he departed to share in the fate beyond the world of the race of Men. So it was that with his final sight Elendil the Tall, born in Númenór that Sauron in his malice led to downfall, saw the Dark Lord Sauron, the Abhorred, fall defeated - defeated by the blows of Gil-Galad's spear and his sword.  
  
Isildur had risen, but had not been able to intervene in the battle. At the fall of their master the swarms of Orcs had faltered, and Elrond was slicing his way through them. He surveyed the ground around him. Gil- Galad and Elendil his father lay dead, but Sauron was defeated. He took the hilt of the broken sword Narsil, and found that only a few inches of blade remained. Still, he cut the finger that bore Sauron's ring from its body, and took it up, removing the ring. Though it was extremely hot, Isildur did not drop it.  
  
Elrond and his forces had achieved victory against the few remaining orcs, and when he returned to Isildur he saw the Ring, and knew what must be done. "You must destroy this ring," he said. "Throw it into the fires of Orodruin, where it was forged. Then we shall be rid of the last trace of Sauron's evil."  
  
"My brother and father are dead," said Isildur, "and I will take this precious ring in their memory. The Enemy is defeated, ring or no."  
  
"Defeated," said Elrond, "but not destroyed. And that ring has more power than you imagine. With it, Sauron nearly conquered all Middle-earth, years ago. "  
  
"Even if he had not, I would not take this thing, as I would not take the armor of the Orcs. It is one step from taking up an enemy's weapons to taking up his cause. And that ring contains much of the Enemy's power and malice."  
  
Isildur did not listen to Elrond's advice, but kept the ring and returned to Minas Anor in Gondor, once the city of his brother. When, in the second year of the new age, marked by the overthrow of Sauron, Isildur was killed and the ring lost, Elrond thought as he had spoken on that day: Lost, but not destroyed.  
  
©2002 Morel. All rights reserved, except as noted in the Disclaimer. 


End file.
